Tool time: Remember earlier this spring, when we featured 15 top tools in The Herald’s Home &Garden section? (See www.tinyurl.com/toolsinTheHerald if you missed it.)
We had asked readers to tell us if we missed any essentials and, it turns out, we did.
Natalie Dyer, 58, of Lynnwood, said she would never be without her garden claw.
It’s a cultivator with a long handle with a T-bar top for easy maneuvering. Its end features four, sometimes three, sharp powerful prongs set at strategic angles.
“It loosens the soil. It loosens the weeds like the dandelions, but you don’t damage their tap roots,” Dyer said.
“You can use it around established plants and unestablished plants. I use it to turn the compost. It doesn’t break the back. It is worth every penny. If I could only have one tool in my garden, this would be it.”
Joan Deigert of Arlington said we left out a tool in constant use in her garden.
“You’ve got to have a tarp,” she said, adding that all-purpose tarps are especially great for areas where you need to weed or prune out a lot of bulky stuff that won’t fit nicely into tubs, buckets or even a wheelbarrow.
“That way I’m not dragging the 5-gallon container across my yard,” Deigert said. “It holds a ton.”
Tarps are also handy for containing messes from repotting jobs and for moving unwieldy plants around the garden or when you’re doing major transplanting projects.
Get wild: Do you wish you had more birds, hummingbirds, butterflies and other wildlife in your backyard?
You might just have to attend the free Camano Island Backyard Wildlife Habitat Garden Tour.
Hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 26, starting at Camano Multipurpose Center, 141 East Camano Drive.
Explore 10 wildlife-friendly gardens on Camano Island, from small to large, simple to extravagant, forested to waterfront
Call 360-387-2236 or see www.camanowildlifehabitat.org for more information.
Sarah Jackson: 425-339-3037, sjackson@heraldnet.com.
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